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Archive for the tag “Y-chromosome”

This blog suggests that the failure of Richard’s Y-chromosome to match that of the Dukes of Beaufort doesn’t make him a male line descendant of Edward III through the “illegitimacy” of Richard, Earl of Cambridge.

The issue it fails to address is this:
The inconsistent chromosome has several other, more likely explanations – that Richard III’s Y-chromosome has degraded, or that false paternity in the Beaufort-Somerset line is far more probable because the latter is much longer, as we explained here.

Furthermore, as pp. xii-xvi of Ashdown-Hill’s Cecily Nevilleexplain, citing heraldic evidence, the “forked beard” portrait below, said to be of Richard Duke of York (with Cecily), as taken from Penrith church, is far more likely to be of his father-in-law Ralph Earl of Westmorland (with Joan Beaufort). That the portrait doesn’t resemble Edward III is unsurprising because Westmorland’s most recent known royal ancestor was Ethelred II.

We have no DNA taken from Edward III to compare with Richard’s or the Beaufort family’s. Sorry to repeat ourselves, but if people repeat errors, we must do so.

This very good blog post details the career and planned future of Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, who might have succeeded Henry VIII had he not died suddenly at seventeen and a legitimate half-brother been born a year and a quarterlater. It also states his original and current burial places, the latter being St. Michael’s Church, Framlingham, together with his wife, Lady Mary Howard

Henry Fitzroy, whose mother was Elizabeth Blount, is one of the few adults in the disputed male line from Katherine de Valois’ widowhood. Her sons from this relationship(/s) were Edmund and Jasper, surnamed either Beaufort or Tudor, the second dying without issue in 1495. Edmund had only one son, later Henry VII. He had several sons – some died in infancy and Arthur as a teenager without issue in 1502, leaving Henry VIII. Henry Fitzroy and Edward VI were Henry VIII’s only sons not to die in infancy. That leaves seven men, five of whom are guaranteed to share a Y-chromosome, plus Fitzroy and Jasper, just in case their mothers’ private lives were even more complicated.

We also know precisely where to find Owain, the last proven Tudor – somewhere within the pre-Reformation bounds of Hereford Cathedral. So the evidence to test John Ashdown-Hill’s theory is definitely at hand.

The other point to remember is that the earldom of Richmond was under attainder from 1471-85, so the future Henry VII did not hold it until he “unattainted” himself after Bosworth.

Lionel of Antwerp, Duke of Clarence, was born today in 1338, although he died just before his thirtieth birthday. He is, of course, a mixed-line direct ancestor of Richard III but he is the brother of Edmund of Langley, Richard’s male-line great grandfather.

Here, John Ashdown-Hill spoke to Nerdalicious about his attempts to locate Lionel and secure a little DNA. You may compare it with our earlier piece about a similar search.

“A skeleton excavated at the presumed site of the Grey Friars friary in Leicester in 2012 is almost certainly that of the English king, Richard III (1452 -1485), and mtDNA (which is passed from mother to child) extracted from the skeleton matches mtDNA taken from descendants of Richard’s sister Anne of York. However Y-DNA (which is passed from father to son) extracted from the skeleton apparently doesn’t match Y-DNA taken from descendants of Henry Somerset the 5th Duke Of Beaufort, who according to history descended from Richard’s 2nd great grandfather Edward III (1312 – 1377).

“The implication according to geneticists, and the media, is that there is a ‘false paternity event’ somewhere between Edward and the Somersets. Also, the false paternity events don’t end there, for only 4 of these 5 Somerset descendants match each other. And it may be worse even than this: the patrilineal line of a Frenchman named Patrice de Warren apparently traces back to Richard III through the illegitimate son of Edward III’s 4th great grandfather, Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou (1113 – 1151).

“But de Warren’s Y-DNA doesn’t match that of either Richard III or any of the Somersets. In this note, a formula for calculating the time of the most recent common ancestor is introduced, and some of its consequences outlined. This formula arises from a mathematical framework within which it is possible that the traditional genealogy is correct, and that Geoffrey Plantagenet was the father of a male line incorporating Richard III, all 5 Somersets, and Patrice de Warren.”

Me again: The above prompted me to look back at some of the articles that abounded in 2015, when discussion about Richard’s DNA was rife. I selected the following, if only because of the eye-catching family tree:-

One thing of which we can be certain is that Richard III never played snooker. It was not invented until 1875 in Jabalpur by a Colonel Chamberlain (1). Nevertheless, it is an excellent vehicle for demonstrating the laws of probability with particular reference to the descent of the Plantagenet Y-chromosome from Edward III.

Imagine that you have walked into a snooker club where a member lends you four white balls and fifteen reds, the white balls obviously from more than one set, but in a drawstring bag. The cue balls represent the paternal links from Edward III to Richard III and the reds represent the descent from Edward III to Henry, 5th Duke of Beaufort (2). We already know that the 5th Duke’s living putative descendants have a different Y-haplogroup to Richard III, indicating that there is at least one “false paternity event” in one or both lines, but “Somerset 3” has a different Y-chromosome to his putative cousins, showing that another such has occurred at some time since 1760.

The bag is now held towards you and you are invited to insert your hand and withdraw a ball but you cannot discern its colour until you are holding it outside the bag – we are assuming randomness a priori. The probability of one random ball being red is 15/19 or approximately 79%. If you withdrew two balls, the probability of both being red is 15×14/19×18 or about 61%. The probability of three balls all being red is 15x14x13/19x18x17 or about 47%.

The probability of any paternal link in these chains being false is the same as stated above. We only know that there is one such event and it is 79% likely to have been in the descent to the 5th Duke but 21% to Richard. We cannot yet assume there to be more than one broken link in either chain and it would take three “milkmen” for the red ball (Beaufort) probability to fall below 50% and for a York false paternity event to be probable.

He lost his head at Pontefract so what was he doing on sale in Colchester?

This Kathryn Warner post gives a lot of detail about Thomas Earl of Lancaster’s life, rebellion and execution six days after the Battle of Boroughbridge. Here we explained the circumstances in which John Ashdown-Hill is seeking his remains, to solve the York/ Beaufort Y-chromosome mystery.

Incidentally, the other Thomas of Lancaster you may encounter in a search engine was Henry V’s brother and Duke of Clarence but died at the siege of Bauge, a few months before his King and exactly 99 years after his namesake.

What follows was written entirely by Caroline Tilley, Senior Reporter of the Daily Gazette/Essex County Standard

Secret marriages, scandalous affairs and one of the best-kept secrets in English history….

WHEN you have helped to unearth arguably the greatest historical find of the 21st century, some people might decide to put their feet up.

Not Dr John Ashdown-Hill.

Not satisfied with finding the bones of Richard III, arguably England’s most notorious king underneath a Leicester car park, Dr Ashdown-Hill has now been riffling through the secrets of his elder brother Edward IV.

King of England for two periods in the 15th century, Edward Plantagenet’s life seems about as far removed from his brother, Richard’s, as conceivably possible.

A notorious womaniser with illegitimate children scattered across the country, scandal plagued his reign with secret marriages.

Yet all is not as it seems, as Dr Ashdown-Hill has explored in his new book.

The historian, who studied at the University of Essex and now lives in Manningtree, has unearthed evidence which appears to show Edward IV had a relationship with one of his military rivals.

He said: “In the summer of 1462 he met Henry, Duke of Somerset. Contemporary accounts tell us Edward loved him.”

If true, the claim would be one of the most explosive facts to come to light about a king renowned for his womanising.

There is certainly evidence, with a chronicle written at the time reporting how the two shared a bed.

Dr Ashdown-Hill said: “I don’t know why it’s been ignored.

“No-one has really picked it up. I think history is very surprising.”

Dr Ashdown-Hill made the headlines when, thanks partly to his painstaking work, the lost bones of Richard III were uncovered under a Leicester car park.

The notorious king has intrigued historians for centuries after allegedly killing off his nephews, the so-called princes in the tower and Edward IV’s sons, to take the throne.

His death at the hands of Henry VII, father to Henry VIII, marked the end of the famous Wars of the Roses.

It had been believed Richard’s bones had been thrown in a river by an angry mob a myth perpetuated by local legend, 50 years after his death at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485.

The lesson not to take evidence at face value is something Dr Ashdown-Hill is now applying to his work on Edward IV.

He said: “I had always been interested in Edward IV because of what he had to show about Richard III and his claim to the throne.

“A woman called Jane Shore was said to be his mistress for a long time. In fact, I have shown there is no evidence of this.

“It’s extraordinary. Even historian Rosemary Horrox said there was no contemporary evidence of it, yet she didn’t come to the obvious conclusion.”

Dr Ashdown-Hill added: “It was said Edward IV was a great womaniser and he had numerous bastards.

“In fact, Edward IV only recognised one illegitimate child, which he called the Lord Bastard.

“Henry VII then recognises another of his so-called children called Arthur Plantagenet. So it seems he might have had two or three illegitimate children.

“But so did Richard III and yet no one calls what he did outrageous. So why did they say this of his brother?”

Dr Ashdown-Hill believes the secret is tied up in an Act of Parliament which made Richard III king in 1483, after the death of his brother.

While the throne was meant to pass to the eldest prince in the tower, Richard claimed they were illegitimate and instead took the throne for himself.

But the two princes weren’t the only of Edward IV’s so-called legitimate children to be cut off. In fact, there were seven altogether.

Dr Ashdown-Hill believes it was this which has caused the confusion and led to historians believing Edward IV had so many illegitimate offspring.

Edward IV is not the only project Dr Ashdown-Hill is working on.

His work on Richard III led to the discovery of today’s Plantagenet female line through DNA.

He also uncovered somewhere along the line adultery had appeared, with at least one so-called father being displaced.

Dr Ashdown-Hill does not know whether this adultery happened in more modern or medieval times.

He is now trying to get his hands on the bones of Thomas of Lancaster, a relative of Richard III, whose bones were sold at auction in Colchester 1942.

It is not known where the bones are now but if he uncovers them, Dr Ashdown-Hill hopes to be able to pinpoint more accurately if the adultery happened before or after the birth of Richard III.

So after recovering the bones of Richard III and untangling the web of Edward IV, what’s next for Dr Ashdown-Hill?

As well as chasing possible living descendants who could give him DNA to pinpoint the elusive princes in the tower, he is next turning his attention to Richard III and Edward IV’s mother.

He said: “Cecily Neville seems to have spent a lot of her time being pregnant.

Once upon a time, in Northampton, there was a horrid, huge, concrete bus station known locally as the ‘Mouth of Hell.’ It was, to the relief of many, destroyed earlier this year.

Now there are proposals for a new series of shops, cinemas and even a trampolining centre on the site. While that is an improvement, one can only hope that there is a through archaeological investigation of the area before this can take place.

The ‘Mouth of Hell’ stood on what was the old Greyfriars monastery, a large and important friary in the medieval town centre. Leland describes it as, ‘The Grayfreres House was the beste buildid and largest house of all the places of the freres, and stoode a little beyond the chief market place, almost by flatte north. The site and ground that it stoode on longid to the cite, whereupon the citizens were taken for the founders of it. There lay ii. of the Salysbiries buried in this house of Grey Freres. And as I remember it was told me that one of the Salisbyries doughters was mother to Sir Wylliam Par and his elder brother.’

Limited excavation was done in the 1972 before the now demolished bus station was built, and some fragmentary burials and bits of tile, glass, pottery and metal were found. None of the burials appeared to be particularly high status and there were animal bones mixed amongst them. The church was located but its shape was unable to be defined, and the main buildings of the cloister joined the choir rather than the nave.

Greyfriars of Northampton held several notable burials including Friar Bungay (famous in a play as a sorcerer who, with Friar Bacon, creates the Brazen Head to protect England–but in reality a notable scholar and mathematician !) and the 1st Duke of Buckingham, Humphrey Stafford, who was killed at the Battle of Northampton in 1460. He lost his life defending Henry VI in his tent, along with several other prominent Lancastrian lords. Buckingham was the grandfather of Henry Stafford, second Duke of Buckingham, who betrayed Richard III, and his wife was Anne Neville, the sister of Richard’s mother, Cecily Neville. (If the Duke were found, his y-DNA could be used to identify Henry Stafford’s bones if THEY ever turned up in Salisbury, possibly on another Greyfriars site!)

Below are the proposals for the Greyfriar’s site in Northampton. It might be worth contacting the relevant authorities in order to try to ensure that a proper archaeological assessment is given for this important friary, as some of the records for other medieval buildings around the town are scanty and rather poorly recorded.

Recently, DNA testing has been used to sequence the genome of Oetzi the Iceman’s clothing. We are now able to trace exactly where the fibres of his garments, both animal and plants originated over 5000 years ago.

Human DNA was a useful tool in the identification of Richard III’s remains. What about other items from his time? Of course, no fabric remains from his burial, but perhaps testing could clear up another mystery–the fate of the parliamentary robe he presented to Durham. It is supposed to have been ‘lost’ but there IS a blue, late medieval robe amidst the cathedral’s treasures. It doesn’t have the ‘lions’ on it that Richard’s was said to have, but that might be expected as the panels of donated robes were often used to fashion other garments, or draperies. What remains today could be a reconstituted, heavily changed item. Durham cathedral, however, says they think the robe is Italian…well, a modern test such as that performed on Oetzi’s garments could put the mystery to rest forever.

*An interesting connection between Richard and Oetzi the Iceman: they both share the same y-DNA, G2. This haplogroup was common in the earlier neolithic in Europe but lost ground in the chalcolithic/bronze age, when R1b became dominant. G2 reaches its highest frequencies in Sardinia and parts of France but can be found at very low levels throughout much of Europe. So, deep in time, Richard and Oetzi will share a common male ancestor.